Opening The Box
by LarielRomeniel
Summary: Sara keeps her feelings in a box. Leo doesn't think that's healthy.


AUTHOR'S NOTE: Written in hopes that we will actually get some closure on Sara's feelings for Earth-1 Leonard before Leo leaves the Waverider. Thanks to Jael for looking this over!

* * *

Sara found Leo in the library, sprawled over the leather sofa he'd had Gideon make to replace some of the uncomfortable wooden armchairs Rip had originally put in. He was reading a Harry Potter book. "Gideon says she'll have all the stuff you asked for downloaded to a drive by morning," she told him, leaning against the doorway. "Books, movies, TV shows - all of it."

He looked up from his book and smiled at her. "Thank you, Captain Lance. It will mean a lot to the people at home to see what can be created in a world like yours. One without fear or hate."

She snorted. "I think you might be giving Earth-1 just a little too much credit. We've never put the news on for you."

She pushed off the doorway and walked into the room, checking her hip against the semi-circular desk. "There's plenty of fear and hate to go around on our Earth too. It wouldn't need vigilantes if there wasn't."

"It wouldn't need heroes, you mean," he countered, swinging his legs down to sit up, carefully marking his place in his book before setting it down on the coffee table with some others her team had recommended to him. "I don't know if there's any Earth without fear or hate, Sara. But you come from a world where people can speak out against that hate. Like this." He picked up one of the other books and opened it to a bookmarked page. " _Cry about the simple hell people give each other- without even thinking,"_ he read. " _Cry about the hell white people give colored folks, without even stopping to think that they're people too."_

He looked up at her from the vintage copy of _To Kill A Mockingbird_. "Ray… your Ray... tells me this book was controversial, but it's still taught in virtually every school in your America. In my America, Harper Lee would have been shot for what she wrote."

He set the book back down. "I've heard enough stories from _my_ Ray to know that Earth-1 isn't perfect. Maybe there's no such thing. But we both believe we can make Earth-X a better place. Maybe good enough to get a number sometime."

She smiled and nodded. "So, you ready to go back to punching Nazis with your boyfriend?"

He tilted his head to regard her with a slight smirk. "Well, it's not the _first_ thing I want to do with him when I get home," he answered with a suggestive drawl that made her chuckle. "Eager to get rid of me, Captain?"

She blinked in surprise and shook her head. "Uh, no. No. I'm not, but I know you need to get home, now that you've done what you came to do."

"Most of it," he replied.

"I appreciate what you did for my team after Stein died. Jax was able to move on, Mick seems… better… even Nate seems to be thinking straighter these days. And…" she paused, took a breath and shrugged a little, "you've been a big help to us, dealing with Damien Darhk. We're going to miss you."

He smirked, an expression that was so like Leonard's had been. "Even with the touchy-feely psychobabble?"

One corner of her mouth quirked up. "You've got to admit, that puppet was creepy."

"I know, the puppet was a bad idea," he replied, holding his hands up in a gesture of acquiescence. "It's a technique I use on the children of the Resistance back home. Kids… are often more willing to talk things out with a toy than they are with actual people."

Her half smile grew to a full one. "Well, after leading this team for all this time, I can say you're not too far off base on their maturity level. At least for some of them." He chuckled as she walked over to perch on the arm of the sofa. "I didn't know you worked with children."

He nodded. "Mostly. We've taken in a lot of orphans and strays over the years, kids who escaped the camps or who ran away from home when they couldn't stomach the Reich's propaganda any more. Kids like me."

Sara's gaze became soft and sympathetic as he went on, "My dad, Lewis...he was a camp guard, mean as they come. You'd think he'd have gotten his fill of cruelty at work, but… having that kind of power over someone weaker was like a drug to him. He was addicted. So he'd come home from work and kick the crap out of me and my sister."

"Lisa," Sara said softly, leaning toward him slightly.

Another nod. "Yeah. Mick tells me your Snart also had a sister named Lisa, who's still alive. Mine… isn't. Lewis knocked her down a flight of stairs one night, just because she wet the bed. She was only two years old."

He closed his eyes and let out a heavy sigh. "I knew he was going to find a way to blame me for it, so I left before the sun came up, found the Resistance and Mick… and a purpose."

"Punching Nazis and helping children."

"Punching Nazis and helping people in pain," he clarified, opening his eyes. "It's harder with the adults, because most of them don't want to admit they're in pain."

He shifted a little, leaning one elbow against the back of the sofa as he looked up at her. "Sort of like a certain time ship captain I've gotten to know."

That expression… it was just the way Leonard had looked at her that day when he broached the idea of "me and you." Abruptly, she straightened up to put some distance between them. This was Leo, not Leonard. "I'm fine," she said sharply, sliding off her perch and starting toward the door. "Everything I needed to say to Martin, I said at the funeral."

"From what I hear, you may have some things to say to other people who used to be on this tin can," he called after her. "One in particular."

She stopped just before the doorway, still facing it, clenching her fists to keep control. "What did you hear?" she asked in a low, dangerous tone.

"Just that there might be some… unfinished business between you and the version of me that you knew."

Slowly, she turned back to see him watching her with a softer expression than she'd ever seen on her… _their_ Leonard. "This team of yours - they worry about you," he said.

"They talk too much," she huffed.

"They love you," he corrected, then grinned wryly. "Even Mick, although he'd rather go without beer for a month than admit it." The grin faded. "He tells me you and my doppelganger were… close. But he says you haven't talked about Leonard since he died."

"There's nothing to say," she replied.

"Really? Are you lying to me? Or just to yourself?"

Those eyes seemed to see right through her. Just like her… _their_ Leonard could look at her and see into her soul, that time in Russia…

Leo rose and walked to the desk, bringing him closer but not too close. He leaned back against it to watch her. "Sara, I know you prefer locking these things away in a box. But one of these days, that box is going to explode. And trust me, it always happens at the worst possible time, when just one more thing will push you over the edge."

"Sounds like you're speaking from experience," she said, edging a little closer to him.

He _hmmd_ in agreement. "I've seen people get triggered by something and lose focus or go off mission. It never ends well." He raised an eyebrow at her. "I hear you have some experience with that too."

She remembered how her vendetta against Damien Darhk had nearly blown more than one mission. "Guilty," she sighed, moving to lean against the desk next to him.

"You may not want to open the box for your own sake," he said quietly. "But do it for your team, Captain. They need you to be at the top of your game. I'm told your Leonard gave his life to protect his… crew. I don't think he'd want you putting them - or yourself - at risk."

No, he wouldn't. In fact, she reflected, he'd probably try to kick her ass for it. And in this case, she'd probably let him. She sighed again, more heavily this time, and nodded her agreement.

"All right. Gideon, can you please close the doors and make sure we're not interrupted?" Leo asked. As the doors slid shut, he guided her back to the sofa. When she perched on its arm once again, he took a seat to look up at her, giving her the advantage of height, as her… _their_ Leonard used to do.

"All right, Sara," he said, his voice even quieter and gentler than before, as if the sound might shatter her otherwise, "you can say whatever you need to, however you need to. Do whatever you need to do. No judgment, and no holds barred. Go ahead and open the box."

His gaze was so kind now, it was almost too much. She closed her own eyes and drew in a deep breath as thoughts and feelings she'd repressed for more than a year came bubbling up.

"I miss you," she said at last, her eyes still closed. "I miss playing cards with you, even if you cheated all the time. I miss taking the piss out of Rip and the nerd squad with you, and causing trouble with you and Mick. Bar fights aren't the same without you around. Nothing's the same without you around."

She could picture Leonard watching her the way he had when they'd nearly frozen to death together. "Remember when I told you that dying is lonely? Sometimes living is lonely, too."

She took another breath, one that was a little more shuddering. "I miss having you here to talk with me. I miss having you here to second-guess me, to make me think and to hold me back when I need it, like you did in Russia."

Now there was a tremor in her voice. "I've made so many mistakes. All the things that happened with Mick after… after the Oculus… you'd have kicked my ass for ignoring what he was going through. And I would have deserved it. Stein was _operating_ on him, and I _walked away_! What the _hell_ was I thinking?"

She shook her head. "Some Captain I've been. I don't think we'd have broken time if we hadn't lost you. I don't think we'd have lost Martin if we hadn't lost you."

She sniffled, opening her eyes and staring up at the ceiling, unable to look at Leo. Not yet. "I was so mad at you for pulling the Cold Gun on me at the Vanishing Point. Not because I thought you'd hurt me. I knew you wouldn't, you couldn't. I was mad just because - we were arguing when we could have been doing something to save the team. It was such a damned waste of time."

She laughed bitterly. "Which pretty much describes our entire relationship, doesn't it? We wasted time. Months of it. And then when you said you wondered what the future might hold for me and you, I wasted the time we had left by walking away."

She felt tears roll down her cheeks. "It wasn't that I didn't want that future, or that I hadn't thought about it myself," she said thickly. "I thought… we live on a time ship! We had… we should have had all the time in the world! But it ran out... for me… for you… and for me and you. And there's nothing… _nothing_ I can do to get it back…"

Blinking rapidly, she finally looked down at Leo, whose own eyes were glistening with sympathetic tears. "And I've been hiding it all away... because I… I couldn't face another thing that I couldn't fix and-"

She broke off with a choked sob, more tears blurring her vision. She felt Leo's hands grasp hers and let him tug her down into his lap to cradle her gently, his hand tracing a comforting circle on her back while she wept into the crook of his neck.

Eventually she pulled back to meet his eyes. "Thank you," she whispered, her throat feeling too sore for anything more.

He reached up to brush a bit of her hair back. "You're welcome," he replied, his own voice just above a whisper.

She should probably get up, she thought, but she was feeling too wrung out to move, and he didn't seem inclined to make her do so. Instead, he shifted so they could stay more comfortably wrapped around each other.

After a while, she chuckled and asked, "So, is cuddling another one of your therapy techniques?"

He chuckled in answer. "Just for special cases. And you, Sara Lance, are very special," he said, angling his head to smile at her. "You're also a bit of a mess right now," he added, with just a little teasing note in his voice.

She rubbed at her face. "I didn't realize I'd need the waterproof mascara today," she said with a little laugh. "I'm an ugly crier."

"Nothing about you is ugly, Sara," Leo disagreed. "Now, Nate might have left some tissues in the box there on the table. Gotta say, he is a man in touch with his feelings."

She snickered a little before reaching for the box. Yes, there were a few tissues left. She pulled one out to wipe away the traces of tears. "Better?"

"I was going to ask you that. Anything left in the box? Is there anything more you need to say? Anything you still need to do?" he asked, folding one of his hands around hers and squeezing it reassuringly. "Remember, no judgment, no holds barred."

He was looking at her like that again, the same way her… their… no, _her_ Leonard had looked at her that day in her quarters…

And it was too much for her to resist. She leaned forward and kissed him, pouring nearly two years of need and want and regret into the contact.

Reason kicked in after a moment. This was _Leo_ , not Leonard. But when she pulled away, she saw the same look in Leo's eyes that she'd seen in Leonard's at the Oculus, the blue tinged with a shadow of sorrow.

Then Leo gave her a gentle smile, and she realized he still had one hand wrapped around hers, the other splayed against her back. "Told you I'd get through that crusty exterior."

She pushed away from him then, standing quickly and bumping the coffee table as she backed toward the door. "I'm sorry," she gasped, then turned to leave.

"Sara! Don't run away." His voice was still quiet, but commanding.

She froze next to the desk but didn't turn back. "I shouldn't have done that, Leo," she said, staring at the door. At escape. "You have someone you love waiting at home for you and…"

"Sara, look at me."

She turned back to see he'd risen from the sofa, still wearing that gentle smile. "I told you to say or do anything you needed. No judgment, no holds barred," he told her. "When I said that, I figured you'd either slug me or kiss me. Kinda glad you went for the nicer option. A _much_ nicer option, by the way."

"You knew I would…"

"People keep the tightest locks on the strongest feelings," he said. "Hate… and love. From what your team told me about you and your Leonard, I was pretty sure there wasn't any hate in that box of yours. Anger, sure, but not hate. And you proved it with that kiss."

"But… you didn't push me away," she protested. "You… you kissed me back."

He chuckled. "Don't you ever look in the mirror, Sara? Can you blame me?" He held up an admonishing finger. "And before you say anything about my Ray, you should know it's not the first time I've kissed someone in the line of duty, and I _always_ make it up to him."

Those last words came out in a drawl even more suggestive than before, and she couldn't hold back a little giggle. Even if it was slightly hysterical.

"I will admit, though," he mused, "that was one of the best 'line of duty' kisses I've ever had, so I'm going to have a _lot_ of making up to do…"

"Leo…"

"Sara." He stepped closer to her and put his hands on her shoulders. "Let me remind you again, I told you to do what you needed. And the way you looked at me right before… I knew you were seeing _him_ , not me, even if I have the same face. I knew that kiss... that _mutual_ kiss... was what you needed."

She sighed and dropped her gaze. "I… I never got to do more than kiss him goodbye while he was holding down the failsafe at the Oculus."

"So he was either a gentleman or an idiot," Leo answered drily, getting another giggle in response. "Or maybe a little of both. But in any event," he tucked a finger under her chin to gently encourage her to look back up at him, "he loved you."

"How do you… how _could_ you know that?"

One corner of his mouth quirked up. "You said he told you he wondered what the future might hold for the two of you, right?" When she nodded, he continued, "Seems he and I aren't too different in some things. I told Ray the same thing right before the first time I kissed him. Took me weeks to get the courage to say, 'I love you.' Guess that's what happens when you're the product of a crappy father. But even if I couldn't say it, I felt it."

One of his hands slid down to wrap around hers. "I think you felt that for your Leonard too."

"I didn't realize it until it was too late. Until all I could do was kiss him goodbye." She sniffled a little, feeling new tears start. "I'm not sure if knowing how he felt makes things better or worse."

Leo smiled softly. "You'll feel that way for a while. But Sara, _let_ yourself feel these things. Use the box when you have to, but don't leave it locked all the time. Okay?"

She nodded, her throat too closed up to speak now. He guided her back to the sofa, where he wound his arms around her and pressed a kiss into her hair while she wept again; not the stormy sobs of earlier, but a gentle weeping.

He handed her another tissue when her tears ran out once more. "Better?" he asked softly.

She nodded. She did feel lighter, less burdened. Although… "I still miss him."

"Just like I still miss my Mick," he replied. "Love never goes away, Sara. And if I can borrow from that Harry Potter movie Nate and Ray played last night - the ones who love us never really leave us. Whenever you feel lonely, remember that. You're never really alone. You're surrounded by people who love you here on this ship, back home on your Earth… and even on mine."

He kissed her forehead and shifted his arms around her, tightening his grip just slightly when she tensed to rise. "Stay," he murmured. "You shouldn't be alone right now."

She chuckled. "Thought you just said I wasn't alone."

"Well…"

"You just want to cuddle," she teased, getting a smile in return.

"Guilty."

The confession came out in the same intonation her Leonard had used, but this memory only made her smile. She kissed Leo's cheek and nestled in his warmth. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," he whispered, stroking her hair. "Sleep, Sara. Things are always better in the morning."

* * *

ADDITIONAL AUTHOR'S NOTE: We all know Leo is a flirt and a hugger. We also know Ray trusts him implicitly. And I am VERY certain Leo knows just how to make things up to his boyfriend!


End file.
